By taking what we know about user behavior when it comes to saving money, can we nudge users of budgeting software to save more money without them feeling judged or pressured? Final project for University of Baltimore's Master's class in Humans, Computers, and Cognition. The objectives were to take an existing design and apply concepts in the field of psychology, human computer interaction, and user experience to improve or enhance the design.

1. Saving Up
IDIA 640 Final Project: Eric Wronsky

2. 46% of adults would not be able to
cover an emergency expense of
$400 or more without borrowing
money or selling off assets.
Problem
Federal Reserve Report on the Economic Well-Being of U.S. Households in 2015.

3. Emergency funds
In the case of unexpected loss, adults should have enough savings to cover
several months worth of expenses.

4. Can we change existing personal
finance apps to encourage more
savings without seeming
judgmental or overbearing?
Goal

5. Personal finance apps
Mint Pocketguard Wally YNAB

6. Personal finance apps
YNAB (You need a budget)

7. Conflict
YNAB has the user
distribute his or her
available funds into the
categories most
needed before their
next paycheck.

8. Conflict
An example of
budgeting down to
zero.

9. Can we anchor them to save more?
Experiment 1

10. Conflict
Where is emergency
fund?

11. Conflict
Let’s get rainy day or
emergency funds in
there and toward the
top.

12. Let’s prime our users.
Experiment 2

13. Conflict
Current initial screen.

14. Conflict
Prime the users to be
thinking about their
savings goal.
Nothing negative in
here.

15. How to test it
Target user group are already users of YNAB.
Conduct a randomized controlled trial for each experiment.
But one extraneous variable looms large.

16. But what if they
just stop using it?

17. Trigger the user’s aversion to loss.
Experiment 3

18. Offer to pay for the service
YNAB costs $45 per year.
Offer half of the subjects the cost of a one year
subscription, regardless of their dedication to the study.
The other half, offer them the cost of a one year
subscription only if they meet reporting goals every month.

19. Considerations

20. Screenings and variables
Debts: is it right to encourage subjects to increase their savings if they are
heavily in high interest debt?
Income: What if it changes over the course of the study?
Emergencies: What if a person legitimately needs to tap into his or her savings?

21. Class concepts
There are so many tools at our disposal to try to influence
behavior.
We have to be selective in not overwhelming our users.

22. Thank you